I had a whole wonderfully witty but sad post written earlier this fall about why I hated the holidays. I was ready to post it when some nagging feeling kept telling me to wait. I try to listen to these nagging nuggets of wisdom as much as I can. So I waited. And waited.
I’m glad I did. Because something happened this year that has taken me by surprise.
I’m actually fucking enjoying the holidays.
It’s started at Thanksgiving this year when I had an incredibly good time with family. Who knew?!
Okay, back up the train. Maybe it started last year, when the hubster and I spent Thanksgiving and Christmas together in our new home in Florida. We had just gotten back from our honeymoon in Southeast Asia. We didn’t decorate anything. We didn’t travel anywhere. We had no guests. We ordered Chinese food. We watched football. We cried over a glass of wine after a family member pulled a fast-one on us again. Oh wait, no. No, that was me. That was only me.
But you know what? It was one of my fondest holidays until this Thanksgiving.
I never quite understood, as an adult, how the holidays could be so magical for people. Dare I say, I was even, cynical about it.
No. Who, me?
In complete honesty, there are some pretty legit reasons why the holidays have sucked for me that I won’t go in depth about. In a nutshell, the holidays have always been a mixture of feeling like an inconvenience and when I was younger, being shuffled around seeing who I could go visit. I still try to coordinate schedules and am finding that since we don’t have kids, we have very little pull over who will come see us. This may be our reality from here on out or we may have to resort to begging?
That’s a good reason to have kids, right? Presents and shit.
This year, I really focused on the wonderfully supportive people I have in my life. I reminded myself again, that I’ve been given a chance to start my own traditions, create my own less drama-filled holidays. I absolutely love that feeling!
We may be small, but I have my own little family of three, if you include my overweight, ginger cat. Said ginger cat also looooooves being dressed up for the holidays.
I love our little family. We create some hysterical memories. One of the best things about meeting my husband has been the life we’ve brought together, just the two of us…and said ginger kitty.
I wanted to celebrate and embrace this newfound love of the holidays, so I busted out our holiday decorations. Remember how I didn’t even want to decorate for Halloween? What is happening to me?
I noticed, quickly, that I donated a majority of items a couple years ago. So, of course, I had to go to Target to get more. Then, the hubster was on-call on a Friday, so I went back to Target after work…and got more.
I was Clark fucking Griswold. I just couldn’t stop!
I spent the evening drinking wine, listening to Christmas music and decorating with all my new and old goodies. (It all still fits in 1 Rubbermaid bin, my practical mind wouldn’t allow too much.) I think the results are quite pretty!
The hubster keeps walking around our place saying, “I really like all the decorations, honey.”
Maybe he just likes that I’m not totally annoyed by the holiday season and I’m actually pretty happy.
And I have to admit it…I am too.
Happy Holidays, guys!